The art of letting go!
Dec 31, 2024
Today it’s time to say bye and hi.
As we step into the new year, it’s time to learn to let go of things that are past its expiry date and things that are stuck to our shoes.
New resolutions are futile if we also don’t discard old habits.
What do you let go?
I think we don’t have much of a problem to let go of things that are clearly toxic or not working for us (though even this could be a problem for many!).
More concerning are the things we're unsure about or those not working but we cling to, obvious to others but not to us
These two corrode slowly but have a much bigger impact on your life because it drains you, it wastes your energy and negatively changes you.
Here are two negative behaviors in this category. A) hope against hope, and B) sunk costs
Example A: Here’s a personal example that drives this point.
I have an autistic son - On a scale of 1 to 10 in terms of his functional skills, he is in the middle. Right in the middle. It was hard but it was also obvious to us he can’t do certain things how much ever we wished for him. That allowed us to reset our expectations and help him the best way we can. We didn’t put him in a conventional school, we took a very drastic approach that suited his capabilities.
However we see a lot of autistic children who are higher - probably at 8 - you can’t make out they are autistic unless you spend some time with them. Their parents unfortunately have a really tough time to reset their expectations.
We are this close.. Let’s give it one more push.. maybe things will change..
Example B: Here’s a lighter example
As a child it was drilled into my head that you can’t waste food - or anything, for that matter. Our family didn’t believe in any expiry date on anything. You’d say we were the ideal for the “sustainable” label. There’s nothing wrong in this - in fact you’d call this a virtue.
Except that, there’s a marginal utility line beyond which it is absurd to do it. The problem is that in many situations this line is not clear to us. Or we are so habituated to carry this along that we don’t see its extra weight.
I applied it indiscriminately to everything. I’d suffer through stuffing my stomach with the unintended extra food on my plate, wearing the same torn shoes, watching a crappy movie because I paid for it, finishing that stale popcorn because it’s criminal to throw it away.. You get my point.
Some of us who don’t struggle with this might laugh at these examples as silly, but the joke is on each of us. It’s not really about the torn shoes, or stale popcorn - it’s about that invisible junk that’s in our heads.
We all carry it.
Let go of sunk costs!
So here’s my wish for you in 2025!
.. (do a chatgpt search to add more)
Happy letting go!
Bonus: Stop lazily declaring your activities/feelings on LinkedIn - “I am thrilled/ honored/ excited/ humbled/.. “ unless you can really add some value to the reader on what they can learn from your experience.
Managing Director at Accenture
1 个月Well put Bala!
CEO at Initiative India
2 个月Very well said Bala ! Loved it
Head of Marketing @ GEDU Global Education | Other Brands: Wiley, VLCC, Affle, U2opia Mobile, Merkle DWA, NIIT
2 个月Love the last para :)
Senior, University of Wisconsin-Madison
2 个月Amazing post! Happy new year to you! I loved this write up. What popped up in my head while reading this article was what we define to be comfortable to us. Furthermore, once we figure that out, we can then act accordingly and let things go/accept reality for what it is. If you are not comfortable with something, then by definition we can let it go - these are the burdens we carry for no reason. Thank you for sharing this resonated with me heavily.
Writer/Editor/Nonprofit Communications
2 个月????Loved this, Bala. You have used your personal experiences to make a couple of really great points. Thanks for this and happy new year! ??